


Palliative Care (I'm FINE remix)

by amindamazed (hophophop)



Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Emotional Support, F/M, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-28
Updated: 2015-06-28
Packaged: 2018-04-06 15:25:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4227012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hophophop/pseuds/amindamazed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“Oh, so all this is in the name of science?”</em>
</p><p>Sometimes Joan did just need a quick break from too much Sherlock, but Marcus thought it was more, this time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Palliative Care (I'm FINE remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sanguinity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguinity/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Preventative Medicine](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1558394) by [sanguinity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguinity/pseuds/sanguinity). 
  * In response to a prompt by [sanguinity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanguinity/pseuds/sanguinity) in the [remixmadness2015](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/remixmadness2015) collection. 



Joan was sitting on the stoop when Marcus pulled up, and she’d opened the passenger door to slide in before he had time to shift into park. “Let’s go,” she said, and he raised his eyebrows at the change of plans. “Back to the station, to the park, to New Jersey for all I care. I just have to not be _here_ for a while.”

Marcus nodded and let the car glide forward, considering a destination in light of her comment. “I cleared an hour for a late lunch. Hungry?” He glanced at Joan’s hands shifting in her lap and did a double-take. “Hey, you okay? You’ve got— What happened to your wrist?” He pulled up at the stop sign at the end of the block and turned to get a better look at the red abrasions. She grimaced and pulled her sleeve down, dropping her hands to her thighs.

“It’s nothing. A little irritation from a handcuff exercise. It’ll be _fine_.” A car horn from the disgruntled driver behind startled both of them, and Marcus looked away to check the cross street again before moving on. The F-word. Never a good sign.

She stared out the window taking measured breaths, and he took that as license to proceed without asking more questions. Fifteen minutes later he turned off the engine in the tiny lot outside a diner in Queens and patted the dash of the fleet car. He always had good parking luck with this one. Joan gave a half-smile at the ritual. “Your streak continues,” she said with her usual amusement, all trace of whatever was “fine” packed away behind the hint of chagrin in her eyes.

“I’m not gonna jinx it,” he replied, and hoped that was true.

There weren’t any free booths so they sat at the counter and looked at their menus in companionable silence. Sometimes she did just need a quick break from too much Sherlock, but he thought it was more, this time. With their orders taken and teas brought — iced for him, hot for her — he waited until she’d taken her first sip and set the cup down before he leaned sideways and pressed his shoulder into hers. She pressed back with a smile, but when he didn’t move away again she glanced at him, and he raised his eyebrows in invitation. She sighed and slumped a bit, turning the tea cup around and around in her hands. He straightened up again and stirred the straw back and forth through the ice cubes in his tea, waiting. She usually had plenty to say; their conversations never lagged. Sometimes, though, with some topics, she couldn’t begin on her own; it was like she needed a jump start. Or a little push. Sometimes a literal nudge was all it took.

She gripped the edge of the counter with both hands like it was the safety bar on a roller-coaster carriage. “He wants to start meeting Moriarty regularly in prison.”

“What!?” That came out louder than he meant it to, and she winced. He lowered his voice but not the red flags dancing before his eyes. “Why?”

“Because she’s yanking his chain and he won’t break it off. 'Valuable opportunity to study the mind of a criminal genius,' is what he calls it," mimicking his accent and tone. "Subjecting himself to whatever manipulative bullshit she’ll try next, more like. But she doesn’t have to live with him, after.” She rubbed her abraded wrist.

Neither do you, Marcus thought. He’d asked about that once before, when they first started seeing each other properly. It just worked, she said, halfway between defensive and protective. And from what Marcus had seen, that was mostly true. Except when it wasn’t. Sometimes he worried that his real role in her life was as an escape hatch. Most of those times he chided himself out of the mood: if that’s what the lady needs, he’s happy to oblige. It wasn’t like he never needed to get away from the guy himself. A little Holmes went a long way, and she never got just a little Holmes.

“But anyway, he couldn’t just tell me that. Instead, he had to create a stupid scenario to get my attention. Which, in retrospect, is _her_ , all over. He gets squirrelly every time she sends him one of her damn letters." The waiter brought their food then, and out of the corner of his eye Marcus watched Joan as the stiff smile she gave to the waiter faded. She used the cover of the interruption to let herself seethe quietly, closing her eyes in what amounted to a long blink. "Yeah." She patted her fork and knife, adjusted their positions slightly on either side of the plate, and glanced briefly his way with a wry quirk of her mouth. "So I was already pissed off at him by the time he brought it up. At which point I figured that if I didn’t come wait for you outside, I was going to pitch him off the roof.” She exhaled loudly through her mouth. “So." She turned to him and smiled, a real one. "Thanks.”

He smiled back. “No problem. I’d much rather have lunch with you here than have to meet _you_ in prison for committing Holmecide.”

“Oh my god,” she muttered, shaking her head.

He chuckled. “I know. It’s not mine. It’s been going around the station for a while — you hadn’t heard it before? It was Nash, actually.”

“Really? He never struck me as much of a wordsmith.”

“He just needs the right inspiration.”

“Don’t we all,” she said, shifting to the edge of her stool to loop her arm through his and drop her head to rest on his shoulder for a moment. She squeezed his forearm. “Don’t we all.”

**Author's Note:**

> How I got here: Although I figure Sherlock's mention of Joan's "boyfriend" at the start of "Preventative Medicine" could be read as sarcastic, it also could be taken at face value, particularly if you assume "[Foundations](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1175130)" as a prequel. Which I do. And then I wondered what the hell would make Sherlock think handcuffing Joan in order to tell her something was a good idea.


End file.
